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Contact Info
Home Town Medway
Last Address Waltham, Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Buried at: Prospect Hill Cemetery, Millis, Massachusetts
William Newland enlisted with the U.S. Navy from his birth state of Massachusetts in 1862 and served as an Ordinary Seaman on the USS Oneida. His conduct as loader of Oneida's after 11-inch gun during the August 5, 1864 Battle of Mobile Bay was recognized by the award of the Medal of Honor.
William D. Newland
Seaman • Civil War
Medal of Honor
Medal of Honor- Awarded for actions during the Civil War"
The President of the United States of America, in the name of Congress, takes pleasure in presenting the Medal of Honor to Ordinary Seaman William D. Newland, United States Navy, for extraordinary heroism in action while "serving on board the U.S.S. Oneida in the engagement at Mobile Bay, Alabama, 5 August 1864. Carrying out his duties as loader of the after 11-inch gun, Ordinary Seaman Newland distinguished himself on board for his good conduct and faithful discharge of his station, behaving splendidly under the fire of the enemy and throughout the battle which resulted in the capture of the rebel ram Tennessee and the damaging of Fort Morgan."
General Orders: War Department, General Orders No. 45 (December 31, 1864) Action Date: August 5, 1864 Service: Navy Rank: Ordinary Seaman Division: U.S.S. Oneida
Civil War
From Month/Year
April / 1861
To Month/Year
April / 1865
Description The American Civil War was an internal conflict fought in the United States from 1861 to 1865. The Union faced secessionists in eleven Southern states grouped together as the Confederate States of America. The Union won the war, which remains the bloodiest in U.S. history.
Among the 34 U.S. states in February 1861, seven Southern slave states individually declared their secession from the U.S. to form the Confederate States of America. War broke out in April 1861 when Confederates attacked the U.S. fortress of Fort Sumter. The Confederacy grew to include eleven states; it claimed two more states, the Indian Territory, and the southern portions of the western territories of Arizona and New Mexico (called Confederate Arizona). The Confederacy was never diplomatically recognized by the United States government nor by any foreign country. The states that remained loyal, including border states where slavery was legal, were known as the Union or the North. The war ended with the surrender of all the Confederate armies and the dissolution of the Confederate government in the spring of 1865.
The war had its origin in the factious issue of slavery, especially the extension of slavery into the western territories. Four years of intense combat left 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers dead, a higher number than the number of American military deaths in World War I and World War II combined, and much of the South's infrastructure was destroyed. The Confederacy collapsed and 4 million slaves were freed (most of them by Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation). The Reconstruction Era (1863–1877) overlapped and followed the war, with the process of restoring national unity, strengthening the national government, and granting civil rights to freed slaves throughout the country.
My Participation in This Battle or Operation
From Month/Year
April / 1861
To Month/Year
April / 1865
Last Updated: Mar 16, 2020
Personal Memories
Memories Medal of Honor Awarded for actions during the Civil War
For The President of the United States of America, in the name of Congress, takes pleasure in presenting the Medal of Honor to Ordinary Seaman William D. Newland, United States Navy, for extraordinary heroism in action while serving on board the U.S.S. Oneida in the engagement at Mobile Bay, Alabama, 5 August 1864. Carrying out his duties as loader of the after 11-inch gun, Ordinary Seaman Newland distinguished himself on board for his good conduct and faithful discharge of his station, behaving splendidly under the fire of the enemy and throughout the battle which resulted in the capture of the rebel ram Tennessee and the damaging of Fort Morgan.
